Proposed immigration legislation in Congress may allow more deportees to eventually return to the United States legally.

The provision comes in response to immigrant advocates’ criticism of record-high levels of deportations in recent years, especially those affecting unauthorized immigrants who lived in the United States for years and sometimes decades.

If approved, the measure would change existing regulations to enable a wider range of people who were expelled from the country to apply for waivers. It also would give the Department of Homeland Security greater leeway to grant those waivers, which then enable applicants to seek return visas. Parents, children and spouses of U.S. citizens or legal residents who meet certain requirements would be eligible to apply, as long as they were in the United States on or before Dec. 31, 2011.

Opponents of the provision, which is part of a bipartisan bill written by eight senators, see it as overreaching, unfairly rewarding unauthorized immigrants and contradictory to the federal government’s obligation to keep out individuals who lived in the U.S. without permission. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., has filed an amendment to kill this allowance in the overall Senate immigration bill, which is undergoing revisions in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Others said the waiver proposal recognizes deportation’s toll on families that have established roots in the United States.

“I think it’s a reflection of the heavy weight of enforcement that has torn families apart,” said Angela Kelley, vice president for immigration policy and advocacy at the Center for American Progress in Washington, D.C. “It’s not a free admission, it’s a waiver and they still have to apply and be approved. It is a safety valve for families to reunite.”

Applying for waivers

The current process allows certain deportees to apply for an I-212 waiver. Approval means the applicant is exempted from conditions that would normally make them ineligible for return to the U.S., including previous deportation or other removal proceedings.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services did not respond to requests for information about how many I-212 waivers it has granted in years past. Similar requests to the Department of Homeland Security went unanswered.

The U.S. State Department provided data showing that last year, it exempted at least 1,082 disqualifying reasons in reviewing applications for return visas.

Also last year, the Department of Homeland Security reported a record 409,849 deportations, compared with 396,906 in the previous year. The jump, part of an upward trend in recent years, was driven by increased apprehensions of unauthorized immigrants who have lived in the U.S. for longer periods of time. It resulted from immigration authorities boosting enforcement beyond the U.S.-Mexico border, partnering with local law-enforcement agencies and auditing more workplaces, experts said.

Abel and Zulma Muñóz are two people affected by this trend.

After spending nearly 18 years in the United States, buying a home, starting a business and having three children, the couple were deported to Tijuana in 2007 after applying for legalization on the advice of a lawyer who turned out to be wrong, said their daughter Leslie Muñóz.

The couple had originally entered the U.S. on visas allowing them to bring their first-born son for leukemia treatment. The son died, but by then Zulma Muñóz was pregnant with a second child and the couple decided to stay so they could get proper health care for the baby.

That second child, Leslie Muñóz, was 16 when her parents were deported. She became caretaker for her two younger siblings.

Now 23, she aims to be reunited with her parents but is measured about the prospects.

“It does make me feel a little hopeful, not only for me but for other children that have also gone through the same struggle that we have,” Muñóz said. “Another part of me doesn’t trust (the government) because we’ve heard a lot of speculation about a new immigration reform, but it’s never finalized and there are more deportations than ever now.”

Views from Mexico

Research by Colegio de la Frontera Norte, a Tijuana think tank that for three decades has studied the flow of migration between Mexico and the United States, shows a changing profile for deportees.

Up to 2007, the vast majority of deportees identified themselves as residents of Mexico, according to the report, which was released recently by Colef president Tonatiuh Guillén López. Since then, rising numbers of deportees have listed the United States as their place of residency.

In 2007, 6.3 percent of those surveyed identified themselves as U.S. residents. By 2011, the figure was 33.1 percent.

The study also found that growing numbers of deportees had stayed for longer periods in the United States: More than 17 percent of deportees surveyed in 2011 said they had lived in the U.S. for six to 12 years, compared with 1.7 percent in 2007.

If the Senate waiver provision becomes law, immigration attorneys on both sides of the border said it will likely still be difficult to obtain an I-212 waiver.

“Even if it’s on the books, the implementation of it is so complicated,” said Brian Jones of the Guerra & Johnson law firm in downtown San Diego. “I don’t see anybody standing up for those people — those who are out of the country. And even if it’s implemented, I feel it will be pulling teeth every step of the way.”

Giselle Stern Hernández and her husband, Roberto, who asked that his last name not be used, agree that the application process can be tough. The couple were granted a waiver last week, meaning that he is now eligible to apply for a visa to re-enter the U.S.

Roberto was deported in 2001 and had to wait a decade to apply for re-entry. Stern Hernández left Chicago to live with her husband outside of Mexico City during that time. Then she came back to the states in 2011 to deal with various criteria for the waiver and return-visa procedures.

“I made the decision to come (to Mexico) and be with him because he is my husband and I wanted our marriage to work and to flourish,” she said. “For people with children in this situation, it’s even more difficult.”

Back in his native country for the first time in nine years, Santiago Cruz of Mexico said he only wanted to go home to Delano in central California. Until last month, he lived there with his wife, their two U.S.-born children and his two older stepchildren.

Days after his deportation, the 26-year-old sat one night at Tijuana’s Casa del Migrante, pondering his next move. “I spend my time thinking of how to go back,” said Cruz, adding that he supported his family with a dairy job that paid $8.50 an hour.

Many of the men who arrive at Casa del Migrante tell similar stories, that they have nowhere to go in Mexico and will try at whatever cost to return to the United States.

A decade ago, perhaps 40 percent of the men who arrived seeking shelter were deportees, said Luiz Kendzierski, the outgoing director of Casa del Migrante. Last year, he said, the figure was closer to 90 percent.

“Their lives are in the United States, their children are there, their spouses are there,” Kendzierski said. “It’s a very complicated situation for them. What do they do in Mexico after living 10 or 15 years in the United States?”